A smoking phone charger forced passengers to the escape slides on a JetBlue plane that had just arrived Saturday night from Barbados, officials said.
The flight crew aboard JetBlue Flight 662 reported the smoking phone charger in the cabin shortly after landing, said the Federal Aviation Administration.
The aircraft was in the process of taxing up to a gate at Terminal 5 at around 8:50 p.m. when the phone charger caused a ‘smoke condition’ inside the cabin, said officials from the FAA, Port Authority and JetBlue.
It was initially believed to have been a laptop computer’s lithium ion battery that caught fire but that information was latter corrected by the FAA.
Port Authority first responders and the flight’s crew evacuated 67 people from the Airbus A320 jet via its emergency slide system.
More than 60 additional passengers exited the plane normally, said the Port Authority.
Seven passengers suffered minor injuries, including smoke inhalation and bruised elbows, the Port Authority reported.
The fire was quickly extinguished by the flight crew, officials said.
The flight from Bridgetown, Barbados was nearly 1 1/2 hours behind schedule, according to the FlightAware plane tracking website.
“Safety is always our number one priority, and we are investigating this incident in coordination with the FAA and NTSB,” said a spokesman for JetBlue.
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